OFFICERS, NOT GENTLEMEN

Four Portland cops who worry us.

Tags:

IMAGE: CHAD CROWE

The latest research from Portland's citizen cop watchdog echoes the "few bad apples" adage, saying a few officers generate a large share of misconduct complaints against police.

Last week's Independent Police Review report doesn't name names, and because internal-affairs complaints aren't public, we don't know who these few cops are. But based on interviews with more than two dozen officers, citizens and defense lawyers, as well as a foot-high stack of legal and criminal investigative documents, what follows are four cops we'd be concerned about if we were Chief Derrick Foxworth.

The never-before-public details of the probes and allegations against these officers illustrate another point the city report makes: It's hard to prove police misconduct-which could explain why these cops are still on the force of nearly 1,000 officers.

Jason Lobaugh: In September 2000, Lobaugh, then a nine-year officer, was taken to the emergency room for what he told an orderly was an overdose of GHB, an illegal narcotic banned by Congress seven months before. Nurses suspected the body-builder was on steroids, and Lobaugh's wife and her mother told police Lobaugh was taking GHB to combat post-workout insomnia. Lobaugh had been showing anger fits-and learning that his wife had spoken with investigators did not help his mood. Reports show she later told police, "Jason held her against the bathroom door, and repeatedly punched holes in the bathroom door next to her head."

Investigators tried to bust Lobaugh's suspected supplier by sending undercover officer Daryl Turner to the Max Muscle store in Beaverton. As Turner was poised to buy some suspected GHB, Lobaugh entered and realized what was going on. He exited and immediately used his cell phone to call the man working the counter, putting a halt to the buy. The man told police that Lobaugh warned him Turner was an undercover cop.

Hindering prosecution and interfering with police are both against the law, but prosecutors found insufficient evidence to charge Lobaugh.

A WW records request in November found that in the past decade Lobaugh racked up 14 notices threatening lawsuits for alleged misbehavior, the third-most of any Portland cop. Lobaugh did not return WW' s calls.

Christopher LaFrenz: One month after two Portland cops were charged in May 2002 with felony assault for a vicious off-duty beating of a guy they'd been bullying in a downtown nightspot, a similar off-duty episode involving another officer was narrowly averted in a Hillsboro pizzeria and bar. Bargoers said LaFrenz, then a four-year cop, called a man playing pool "pussy" and "vagina boy," challenging him to fight for no apparent reason. Ordered to leave, LaFrenz's group confronted the pool player outside at closing time. One of the group-possibly LaFrenz-head-butted the man, causing a golf-ball-sized swelling next to his eye. Bystanders broke it up, but when Hillsboro police investigated, LaFrenz hired a lawyer and refused to cooperate. Due to differing witness accounts, nobody was charged.

One year later, working downtown, LaFrenz was approached by an intoxicated man whom the cop dropped with one punch. The man hit the ground, cracked his skull and almost died, spending several days on a ventilator in intensive care.

LaFrenz and a fellow cop claimed the drunk guy was menacing, having flexed his body in a "bodybuilder's pose." But investigators noted inconsistencies in their accounts. And the only non-Portland cop witness-a recent police-academy graduate named Lee Gilbert, who'd watched intently from a block away in his car's rearview mirror-told police the drunk guy was talking calmly to LaFrenz. Gilbert said the man had his arms flat at his sides for five seconds, doing nothing to provoke the punch.

"It didn't look right," Gilbert, now a Redmond cop, told WW . LaFrenz wasn't charged. When asked about the Hillsboro incident, LaFrenz said, "I don't remember. That was years ago." Did he have regrets about either incident? "No."

David Golliday: Golliday's drunken actions at a bawdy Halloween party attended by off-duty cops and prosecutors sparked a yearlong investigation in 2001. Another cop's fiancée told investigators Golliday grabbed her breasts and reached under her skirt, and later sent cops to her home to pressure her not to complain. He was accused of grabbing at other women, too, as well as swearing at a female district attorney. Police reports also show an unusual level of smack-talk: One cop said, "Golliday was bragging about how he had killed a man with his bare hands in Detroit."

Golliday was demoted from sergeant but not charged. And this was not the first time his mouth and hands caused problems. One evening in 1994, two years after coming to Portland from the Pontiac, Ill., police department outside Chicago, Golliday responded to a family disturbance at a Northeast Portland house. When he asked the 22-year-old son, Christopher Dean, to come down from the porch and talk, Dean replied "Fuck you." Golliday and a partner dragged Dean off the porch and arrested him forcefully with mace. Golliday wrote in his report, "None of this would have happened if he had talked to us with some respect."

Accused of resisting arrest, Dean beat the charge, claiming Golliday took him to a dark, deserted corner of Lloyd Center's parking garage to rough him up before taking him to jail. In court, Golliday said he took Dean to the garage merely to search him. Golliday denied Dean's claim that the cop said, "That's how we take care of things in Chicago," and that he was forced to leave his previous job because he "kicked too many little motherfuckers' assholes like you."

Golliday did not return calls. But Golliday's former boss, retired Pontiac Chief Don Schlosser, confirmed to WW that concern among fellow cops led to Golliday's departure. Said Schlosser, "His methods were not something we wanted to perpetuate in our community."

Joseph Hanousek: Hanousek, who's been the subject of three criminal probes in the past decade, is distrusted not only by Portland lefties but by fellow cops.

In 1996, due to a technical glitch, a ham-radio operator overheard Hanousek talking to a prostitute on his cell phone, and told police the cop seemed to be trading information about upcoming prostitution sweeps for the promise of fellatio. Questioned by investigators, Hanousek, then a nine-year cop, admitted asking the prostitute if she enjoyed giving blow jobs (yes, she said) but denied having sex or planning to.

In 1997, Hanousek's partner and friend, Officer Steven Regalado, was busted for intimidating criminals into helping him sell drugs he'd stolen on the job. Immediately after Regalado's arrest, the police union contacted higher-ups, saying Hanousek had approached them with concerns about his partner just the day before. But some cops suspected Hanousek came forward only because he was tipped off. Two officers told investigators they heard Hanousek say, "I kept telling Regalado he was not smart enough to do that, that he didn't have the organizational skills to pull this off." And one of Regalado's drug buyers told cops she felt Hanousek may have "turned a blind eye." Investigators found evidence suggesting Regalado and Hanousek made a bogus arrest, but there wasn't enough proof to make Hanousek a full-blown suspect.

Shortly thereafter, cops' concerns about Hanousek sparked the infamous Centralgate overtime-fraud investigation. In deposition testimony, Officer Eddie Anderson said Hanousek was one of two officers who "probably... stole the most." Due to lack of evidence, no charges were filed.

Hanousek became a favorite villain of Portland's left in March 2002, after he was caught on video appearing to laugh after blasting a young female protester in the face with red-pepper spray (see "Tales of the Tape," WW , April 2, 2003).

In spring of 2003, citing Hanousek's "extensive history" of failing to show up for trial, county drug prosecutors began refusing to charge any of his arrests. Shortly thereafter, the district attorney's office initiated a criminal probe of a questionable Hanousek arrest, before finding insufficient evidence.

Contacted by WW , Hanousek said he's still a cop because the suspicions were unfounded. "I think everything's been investigated," he said, "but I'm still on the job."